The present invention relates to analyzing soil samples. More particularly, the present invention relates to an automated work station for analyzing a plurality of soil samples to determine characteristics of the soil samples.
Generally, all soils may be subdivided into minerals, organic matter, or a mixture of the two, according to the content of the organic material. Depending on the content and size of the particles, the mineral soils are subdivided into varying degrees of four groups: sand, loam, silt and clay. These generally accepted categories are set out on known family particle size class diagrams and soil texture diagrams, both published by the U.S.D.A. and incorporated herein by reference. However, there are also other components such as iron and aluminum hydroxides (sesquioxides), calcium and magnesium carbonates, powder sand (particles having a size of 10-100 micrometers) as well as soil acidity (pH). On the basis of the data obtained with respect to these nutrients and micronutrients, an attempt is made at determining what nutrients must be added to the soil to obtain optimal performance in the field.
The art of site specific crop management, also known as precision farming or site specific agricultural, has grown rapidly in recent years. Conventional site specific crop management involves managing, or treating, soil in a field based on existing or created zonal maps of fields which indicate soil types or other soil characteristics. A problem which has been encountered with existing site specific crop management techniques is the economically efficient collection, correlation and processing or analyzing of soil samples taken from the field. Such processing and analyzing is typically done in order to determine certain attributes, both physical and chemical, of the soil samples obtained. Problems have also been encountered in the manipulation of the attributes, once determined, in order to decide which nutrients to apply to the field, and in actually applying the appropriate nutrients to the field.
In addition, prior analysis techniques took soil samples from a number of locations in a field, and combined the samples to get one overall combined soil sample for a relatively large portion of a field. Typically on the order of 2.5 acres were represented by a single sample. However, it has become known that the chemical and physical attributes of soil can change drastically within, and across, these zones and may overlap between zones. Thus, analyzing on such a spatially infrequent basis leads to inaccuracies.
One of the primary reasons that soil samples were mixed together to obtain a single sample for such a large area, is that analysis of the soil samples has conventionally been extremely time consuming. Soil sample laboratories have conventionally been used in analyzing the soil samples to determine a number of nutrients and micronutrients found in the plants. A portion of the soil sample is taken to different sections of the sampling lab and analyzed for different parameters. Such a process is both time consuming and costly. Therefore, it has been inefficient to separately analyze large numbers of soil samples across a field to obtain a better understanding of the actual physical and chemical properties of the soil across the field.
In addition, another prior system used in attempting to exercise site specific crop management involves the use of USDA soil maps. Such maps are spaciously variable maps which plot what is believed to be the organic matter content of a field on a grid. The USDA soil maps or other data have then been used as the basis for estimating fertilizer requirements at various zones in the field. However, as with the previously methods, it is known that the chemical and physical properties of the soil can, and do, change significantly inside the zones shown on the map.